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MEMORIAL ADDRESS 



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LIFE AND CHARACTER 



JOHN J. FRAY, A. M., 



First President North Carolina Teachers' Assembly. 



BY PHOF. HENEY LOUIS SMITH. 



RALEIGH, N. C. : 
Alfred Williams & Co., Booksellers, Stationers and Printers. 

1886. 



IN MEMORIAM. 



JOHN J. FRfiY, 

First President North Carolina Teachers' Assembly. 

HIS LIFE AND SERVICES. 

Eulogy by Professor Henry Louis Smith. Delivered at the Teachers' 
Assembly at Black Mountain, June, 1885. 

How many pleasant memories of the first meeting of our As- 
sembly waken in our hearts as we look upon this throng of famil- 
iar faces ! Which of us, as pictures of those happy clays rise be- 
fore his mind, can believe that a whole year has passed away since 
we met among the mountains of Haywood county ! Once more 
we feel the cordial grasp of friendly hands ; again we hear the 
well-remembered tones of familiar voices ; now, as then, the green 
hills of our native land stand sentinel round us, and the untrod- 
den forests rest upon them like the shadow of God ; the same life- 
giving mountain air sweeps through the "Land of the Sky"; the 
clouds are once more drifting with wings outspread from moun- 
tain peak to mountain peak to meet their climbing shadows; the 
same blue heavens bend over us as of old, and 

" Naught can be so sweet to see, 
As old friends meet together." 

But alas ! death has been busy in our ranks :'■ — our eyes seek 
in vain for one honored form, we miss the grasp of one dear 
hand, we fail to hear the tones of one familiar voice! 

" Leaves have their time to fall, 

And flowers to wither at the north wind's breath, 
And stars to set — but all — 
Thou hast all seasons for thine own, O Death ! 

We know when moons shall wane, 

When summer-birds from far shall cross the sea, 

When autumn's hues shall tinge the golden grain — 
But who shall teach us when to look for thee !" 



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Our ship had barely cleared the harbor and moved out on her 
course across the sea, when the pilot was stricken at the helm and 
called to that far-off shore where tempests never blow. That 
clear, ringing voice, so outspoken in its condemnation of what is 
wrong, so fearless in manly scorn of what is base and low, so 
true in defence of what is noble and pure, so gentle and tender 
in tones of sympathy and love, that voice that guided our delib- 
erations and so often made clear the path of duty, is hushed in 
the cold stillness of the grave ! The green turf of his loved Vir- 
ginia covers that manly form which stood preeminent in our 
counsels one year ago. The winter rains and snows have fallen 
upon the cold earth that shrouds his clay : the sunshine and awak- 
ening beauty of spring have decorated that sacred mound with 
vernal freshness ; but naught can waken him from his silent slum- 
ber. In the strong arms of immortal love, he sleeps the sleep of 
the just. 

We have gathered together as an Assembly to do honor to the 
memory of our first President, and testify to the irreparable loss 
we have sustained in his death, to sorrow at the grave of buried 
friendships, and lay our wreath of laurel and tribute flowers on 
the green turf that wraps his clay. 

The story of his life is a shining record of arduous duties well 
and faithfully performed, of difficulties met and overcome by 
strength of will and indomitable energy, of uncompromising 
truth and honor in all transactions with his fellowmen, and un- 
faltering loyalty to the Saviour to whose service he so early con- 
secrated his life and powers. 

Born in Madison county, Va., on the 23d of May, 1840, he 
was distinguished even when a child for his studious habits, his 
piety, and quick and vigorous mind. At the early age of sixteen 
he entered the University of Virginia. When his college days, 
spent in diligent and successful study, were over, he chose teach- 
ing as his profession, and to this ennobling avocation, so dear to 
his heart, devoted all his rare powers of mind and unconquerable 
energy. While thus engaged at Memphis, Tenn., the clouds of 
war, which had so long hung low and threatening on the horizon, 



broke in darkness and tempest over the fair land of his birth. 
When his country called him to defend what he believed to be her 
sacred rights from invasion, he left the quiet work of the school- 
room for the shock of battle, and with characteristic energy threw 
himself into the heart of the conflict. Even among the dashing 
cavalrymen of the ubiquitous Mosby, he was conspicuous for his 
gallantry and daring, and ^ was often chosen by his leader for 
special services requiring the utmost coolness and judgment 
joined with the most intrepid courage. 

When those four long years of blood and tears were over, and 
the sun of the Confederacy went down on the field of Appomat- 
tox, he acquiesced with manly courage in the fate of the cause for 
which he had so long and bravely fought^ and moving to Wake 
county, N. C, resumed his chosen vocation. 

In 1868 he was married to Miss Bettie Way land, of Culpepper 
county, Va. In 1877 he moved to Raleigh and, in the follow- 
ing year, formed a copartnership with Prof. Hugh Morson in the 
management of the Raleigh Male Academy. The school grew 
with unexampled rapidity, and soon became one of the most 
prominent schools of its class in that part of the State. But ex- 
posure during the war, added to years of incessant toil and con- 
finement in the school-room, had fatally undermined his health. 
At the meeting of the Assembly last summer, over which he 
was so unanimously called to preside, the encroachments of dis- 
ease were already painfully evident to his various friends. After 
leaving Waynesville, his strength rapidly failed. In the fall, 
although his health was completely shattered, he returned to the 
school-room, in which the best years of his life had been spent, 
and struggled with characteristic energy against physical weak- 
ness and bodily suffering. But neither firm determination and 
strength of will, nor the efforts of skilled physicians, nor the 
sympathy and prayers of hosts of friends, could stay the progress 
of the destroyer. The few remaining weeks of his life were spent 
in the calm contemplation of approaching death, and daily com- 
munion with the Redeemer on whose atonement he rested his 
hopes of a blissful immortality. On the 23d of December, 1884, 



just 16 years after his happy marriage, his ransomed spirit burst 
its fetters of clay and soared beyond the reach of pain and weak- 
ness into the sunlight and joy of the presence of God. With 
sorrowing hearts and loving hands his Masonic brethren bore his 
body to his Virginia home, and, with many tears, committed it 
to the grave in the confident hope of a glorious resurrection. 

What solemn thoughts crowd upon us as we think of that 
new-made mound which rises above the hallowed dust of him we 
loved so well ! One year ago — and now ! What shadows we 
are, and what shadows we pursue ! The fickle winds, the gleam 
of sunset clouds, the arrow speeding to the mark, the film of 
vapor disappearing in the sky, are fitting types of this transient 
life of ours. Time — vast, silent, swift, all-embracing — hurries us 
onward in its fleet career. Its great bell swinging between earth 
and sky, tolls the funeral knell of our departing years. One by 
one the solemn strokes ring out upon the air. The echoes float 
to our ears for a while, in sadly sweet reverberations ; then, with 
ever softening cadence, die away into the unfathomable abyss of 
the past. 

One by one our departing years, some shining with dazzling 
lustre, some clothed in darkest gloom, slip into the rushing cur- 
rent, and are borne away. With straining eyes we strive to fol- 
low their retreating forms, till mingling with the indistinguish- 
able throng of our receding years, they vanish from our aching 
sight. Soon the last one, gliding out upon the mysterious cur- 
rent, will float away beyond our reach, and through the shades 
of death we will follow it into eternity. But to the eye of Chris- 
tian faith a " light that never shone on sea or land irradiates the 
darkness of the tomb." The grave with its darkness and shadowy 
spectres of the night, is yet the portal that opens into eternal sun- 
shine. The harsh grating of its iron hinges frights the world, 
but beyond we can see the white-robed thousands throng the 
empyrean and hear the triumphant songs of the redeemed. From 
those ineffable heights come the voices of the loved ones who have 
gone before, calling us upward, and listening, we forget the dark 
valley with its shadowy portal, we hear the twelvefold chorus of 



the ransomed rolling its mighty harmonies through the arches of 
heaven and long for that abode of perfect rest and triumphant 
joy. In the full assurance of this blessed hope, trusting in Him 
who burst the bars of death and robbed the grave of its gloom, 
our dear friend passed away. An earnest belief in a personal 
God and faith in a personal Saviour were the foundation of his 
character. The word of God was his constant study and the 
sheet-anchor of his hopes. Each morning and evening he perused 
its sacred pages. From them he learned how to live a Christian 
life and die a Christian death. 

We turn from his grave with saddened hearts and tear-dimmed 
eyes, but we need not weep for him. Free at last from the touch 
of wasting disease, free from the toils and cares of earthly life, 
free from the imperfection of human nature and the restraints of 
a material existence, his immortal soul has really just begun to 
live. It has now found room for the expansion of all its God- 
given powers, and in the presence of God, and the companionship 
of all that is noble and pure, presses forward free and unincum- 
bered in its immortal career. On the " far green hills of God," 
his sanctified spirit walks amid the throng of the redeemed. 

Death was no surprise to him. For months he could trace its 
gradual approach and see its shadow deepening round him. 
Steadily day by day the fell hand of disease fastened more closely 
on his frame. Steadily, day by day, he could feel himself losing 
his hold on life, and borne with accelerating rapidity toward the 
grave. It is hard at any time to contemplate the near approach 
of death, unmoved. But in the full maturity of one's powers, in 
the prime of noble, honored, happy manhood, in the meridian of 
usefulness and ever-widening influence, blessed with a loving 
family and a long retinue of affectionate friends, then — nothing 
but the grace of God and the power of His might can sustain the 
soul in that dark hour when one by one these threefold cords are 
torn asunder. Such grace was given to our departed friend. 
For him the dread unknown was no longer haunted with fearful 
spectres of the night. The Cross of Christ had conquered death 
and thrown a flood of celestial radiance along the path by which 



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the soul returns to the God who gave it. Such was faith and 
firm support in the hour of dissolution. God grant it may be 
ours ! Without it, Death is indeed the king of terrors, the shadow 
of whose wings may well paralyze the proudest and bravest heart 
with deadly fear. 

This spirituality and triumphant Christian faith formed the 
broad foundation from which arose a character lofty, symmetrical 
and spotless as a temple of marble. His religious zeal never de- 
generated into narrow sectarianism. He was one of the very few 
who can see both sides of a question, who can recognize good in 
an opponent, who really feel in their hearts that the adherents to 
a different creed have a right to form their own opinions. Such 
men and women are sadly in the minority. The age of the fagot 
and the stake has perished, we trust forever, but the age of true 
toleration and brotherly feeling among those who differ in religious 
opinions is still in the far distant future. How many there are 
in this land of enlightenment and Christianity who think that the 
great Invisible God has revealed Himself in all his glory to their 
own particular sect or denomination ; that they alone read His 
wonderful word aright, and all the world beside stumbles in 
darkness and sees not the meaning of the revelation; who have 
been reared in such prison-cells of prejudice and partisan zeal that 
they cannot rend the shackles to which their arms have grown 
fast. In his freedom from religious intolerance and narrow- 
minded denominationalism, in his broad sympathy and love for 
all, he, though dead, yet speaks, and teaches a noble lesson which 
many are slow to learn. As a friend and neighbor, his unfailing 
cheerfulness and winning courtesy endeared him to all. He was 
that noblest of our civilization and Christianity, a Christian gen- 
tleman in thought, word and deed. No action of his ever belied 
his words. He was the soul of truth and uprightness. Open, 
frank, candid in speech and action, he scorned hypocrisy and dis- 
simulation. 

His whole life was a protest against duplicity in every form. 
This manly candor and perfect frankness was apparent to the 
most casual accpiaintance. It shone in every lineament of his 



countenance and spoke in every tone of his voice. One felt 
instinctively that here was no lurking place for cant, deceit, or 
double-mindedness. Such qualities felt rebuked and abashed in 
his presence and gave place to nobler things. But it was in his 
chosen vocation that the strength and symmetry of his character 
were most conspicuously displayed. He possessed in a remarka- 
ble degree a faculty which eminently fitted him to be a leader 
and controller of young and immature minds. No man without 
it has ever exerted a great or lasting influence on his fellowmen, 
or stamped his character and opinions on the mind of the world. 
I allude to what psychologists call will-power, that energy of 
spirit and persistence of action which clings to a given purpose in 
spite of opposition or threatened failure, which triumphs over 
physical weakness and unfavorable circumstances, which wrests 
victory from apparent defeat, and compels the minds of men 
to yield instinctive homage and fealty to its possessor. This 
overmastering force of will was one of Capt. Fray's distinguish- 
ing characteristics, and contributed very largely to his unusual 
success in his arduous profession. 

He never fainted nor grew weary in his noble vocation. No 
murmuring against the so-called " hardness of the teacher's lot" 
ever fell from his lips. With loyal constancy to his work, with 
bright unflagging zeal, with unfaltering courage, and contagious 
enthusiasm, he pressed onward in the path of usefulness. On the 
advancement of his pupils in everything that constitutes true and 
noble manhood, he concentrated all his thought and care. No 
sacrifice of time and ease was too great, no labor too arduous, for 
the accomplishment of this high purpose. His love for his pu- 
pils and interest in their progress permeated his whole nature, 
and was visible to the most casual observer. Though a strict 
disciplinarian, he was never harsh and cold. His pupils looked 
to him as a valued counselor and friend. They came to him with 
their troubles and doubts, sure always of a sympathetic hearer 
and the kind advice of a loving guide. 

No wonder that when his soul was burning with enthusiastic 
love of knowledge and virtue, his pupils caught the flame. He 



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believed that in the heart of every man lie sleeping at least the 
germs of noble impulses and noble deeds, ideas of truth and duty, 
aspirations after purity and holiness, longings for something 
higher and better than the past has offered. To stir these dor- 
mant impulses into vigorous, fruitful growth, to waken into 
activity the higher part of the soul, to rend from the mind the 
shackles of ignorance and prejudice and teach it to look with ever- 
broadening sympathy and love on all mankind — these were the 
objects for whose attainment our friend spent his time, his powers, 
his youth and noble manhood. For these high ends he sacrificed 
worldly ease and pleasure, for these he "scorned delights and 
lived laborious days," and even when coming death had cast its 
lengthening shadows, broad and deep before his feet, and set its 
unmistakable seal upon his forehead — when his feet, faltering 
under the weight of long-continued disease, were descending into 
the valley of the shadow, — even then his unconquerable spirit 
dragged his wasted and enfeebled body to the scene of his former 
labors, and he laid on the altar of his life's work the last rem- 
nants of his fading strength. 

Such a life, spent in the pursuit of noble aims, in steadfast loy- 
alty to the right, m lofty self-sacrifice for the good of others, can- 
not be bound in the chains of the grave ; its light shines far into 
the distant future ; its influence and power live in ever- widening 
circles : such a life is as immortal as the immortal souls that are 
influenced by it. 

" No life can be pure in its purpose and strong in its strife, 
And all life not be purer and stronger thereby !" 

Let the life and work of our departed friend, shining like a 
star in the firmament of the past, living still though he has 
passed away, sounding in clear tones above his grave though his 
pale lips lie silent beneath, declare to us that a noble life is one 
spent in the pursuit of lofty things, that a noble soul in the eyes 
of God is one that cherishes high ideals of Christian character, 
that spends its time and energies in generous self-sacrifice for the 
good of others, in unfaltering loyalty to truth and honor, and 
steadfast devotion to a noble vocation. 



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Is our friend and associate really dead? Is he, whom one year 
ago we loved and honored as the embodiment of Christian man- 
hood, really shut up in those cold walls of clay? Ah! no! 
"Though hearts are dust, hearts 7 loves remain." "To live in 
hearts Ave leave behind, is not to die." Death never comes to 
souls like his. He yet lives in his influence for good — lives in 
the souls that he has led to a happy and honored manhood, in 
the minds that he has awakened to a life and activity that shall 
never die, in the lives which he has rescued from ignorance and 
degradation and imbued with a high and noble purpose, in the 
circles of love and friendship which were cheered and brightened 
by his genial, happy spirit, and cordial sympathetic heart. He 
still lives in the scores of young men just entering into active 
manhood, from whose lives are reflected the light of his high- 
souled honor and the spotless sheen of his unsullied character. 

As we look back over the shining record of his noble life, how 
many pictures round which memory loves to linger shine through 
the gathering mist of our saddened eyes ! The youthful student 
with vigorous mind and unflagging zeal pressing onward in the 
pursuit of knowledge till he stands foremost among his associates ; 
the dashing cavalryman, whose ringing shout and shining sword 
are always where steel meets steel in the forefront of the battle ; 
the energetic, high-souled teacher, at the head of his youthful 
adherents waging a nobler warfare than ever stained with a 
brother's blood the battle-fields of earth ; the public-spirited citizen, 
prompt to advance the interests of the commonwealth at any sac- 
rifice of personal convenience ; the tender and loving husband and 
father; the faithful and affectionate friend, whose spotless char- 
acter and chivalric sense of honor invited implicit trust; and 
shining far above all with more than earthly light, the devoted, 
zealous Christian, who, through a long time of loving service 
walked hand in hand with his Redeemer and trod the skyward 
path that leads to the throne of God. 

It is by such lives as these that our earth is ennobled. When 
an immortal soul thus consecrates itself to God and catches a 
beam from the light-fountain of his inexhaustible radiance, then 
indeed is the divinest of all miracles enacted, and this little earth 



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of ours, as it rolls among the countless stars, bears in its bosom 
a spark of the celestial fire that emanates from Deity himself. 
Brighter than any gleam of earthly gold ; more splendid than any 
gaudy trappings of earthly fame and power, shines the record of 
a life so spent. What glittering sheaves of good deeds do the 
years of the past bring to lay upon his grave ! What a throng 
of prayers and benedictions from grateful hearts follow him to 
his last resting-place ! What hallowed memories of friend, coun- 
selor, teacher, guide, husband, father, characterized his name and 
weave garlands of immortal flowers to decorate his tomb ! He 
has erected his monument in the hearts of those who knew and 
loved him, in the lives that were led into nobler and purer man- 
hood by his influence and example. Such monuments defy the 
corroding touch of time. Higher than sculptured shafts of stone, 
brighter than the gleam of marble statues, more enduring than 
granite pile or brazen temple, richer and more splendid than tur- 
reted cathedral or gilded mausoleum ; for they are built of immortal 
souls, the fairest and most precious of all the Creator's handiwork. 
Farewell, thou noble and chivalrous spirit, thou mirror of 
manly honor and patriotic devotion, thou soul of candor and pure 
interested friendship ! Thine hours on earth were not spent in 
luxurious ease, or freedom from care and thought. Thy mis- 
sion was to brighten, to elevate, to purify; to implant new 
views of life and its solemn duties; to rouse immortal minds 
from the sleep of ignorance to higher planes of thought and 
wider spheres of activity. Thy toil is over, thy mission ended, 
thy life-work performed. Thou hast entered into the rest pre- 
pared from eternity for souls like thine. No jarring clash of 
conflicting interests is there, no chilling contact of unsympathetic 
souls, no hand of death smiting into the dust the idols of the 
heart, no infirmities of disease to rack the wasting body and eat 
short all fond hopes and cherished plans. Thou art at rest, 
while we are yet toiling in the dust and heat of the highway and 
lift our longing eyes to the celestial heights thou now hast trod. 
In the presence of God and the companionship of the angelic 
host, amid the throng of the redeemed and glorified, we leave 
thee. Once more, farewell ! 




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